GLENN Roeder has called on the highly-rated youngsters within City's squad to prove to him they can become top-class professional footballers.

Roeder has been impressed with the likes of Michael Spillane and Chris Martin in training, with the latter putting in an eye-catching performance as a substitute against Watford in midweek.

But the manager, who has a good track record of bringing youngsters through the ranks at his previous clubs, wants them to work even harder to have a chance of joining the game's elite.

"If they are good enough they are old enough," said Roeder, dismissing suggestions City's current plight at the bottom of the Championship was too hairy for young players to be thrown into the fray.

"I've got a very good record right the way through Gillingham, Watford and West Ham of playing young players. But only when I know they are good enough, and because they are good enough I know their mentality will be good enough."

And Roeder said the likes of Spillane and Martin had already demonstrated they had more than the stomach for a fight in the first team.

"I would say those two players around this training ground are more confident than a lot of the seniors," he said. "They do think they are good, and that's important. I haven't seen a lot of either of them, but I didn't think that when Chrissy Martin came on the other night he did himself any harm.

"He's got a great physique and he can develop that more. It's how much young players want to improve and get better. The little bit I've seen of him in training, and that's the first time I've seen him in a match the other night, it looks like he's got very good potential. Now I'll need to find out, has he got the attitude to become a really top player?"

And Roeder said the same applied to one of his more senior figures in the form of captain Jason Shackell.

Still only 24, Shackell is another who has risen through the ranks at Colney. But Roeder believed there was still more to come from him.

"Funnily enough I feel the same about Shackell. Shackell has shown me in two games that he can definitely compete and compete well in the Championship, and I've asked him 'do you want to be better than that?'

"And if you do, what are you doing about it? How much extra work are you doing to make you better than what you are? Are you satisfied that you're a local lad, that you've got no ambitions outside of Norwich? And I would like to think he would have ambitions that 'if I want to play in the Premiership and I love Norwich, I've got to help Norwich get to the Premiership. And I've got to get the best out of myself'.

"I can't make an absolute opinion yet because I don't know him as well. But he's 24, and 24 is young for the position he plays. It's an older man's position and I want to see him on this training ground working harder than he does now. And that's not just on the field, making himself a better player technically and learning about being a top-class central defender, I want to see him in the gym as well. He's got a super physique."

You get the sense that City's players will be encouraged to spend plenty of time in the Colney weight's room over the coming months. And Roeder said the benefits of keeping trip could be seen in the very top players - including one he knew very well from his time at West Ham.

"He wasn't a big man at all, Di Canio, physically," he said. "But when he took his shirt off he had arms like legs. He had an unbelievable physique. There's no pill, there's no magic wand, it was sheer hard work in the gym. And I never had to say to Paulo 'go do some extra in the gym'. There was the session and he was in the gym every day.